THE WORST EXPERIENCE EVER! If you are an EXPAT in BANGKOK, AVOID these HOSTS at any cost! I was planning ahead A LONG TERM STAY with my wife and I was FOOLED. The pictures ARE DIFFERENT from REAL LIFE. They don't play fair and honestly, and in the end they tried to fool me and avoid penalties from Airbnb.
Let me explain. I am a Brazilian living in Thailand with my wife prior the Covid-19 situation. I moved to Bangkok and needed to stay using Airbnb because I can't rent a room while GVT is not addressing expats documents properly. So I tried to find a LONG TERM STAY to avoid all the problems of moving on all the time. So we selected carefully a place, prices and found these hosts. When we went to see the apartment, the problems appeared:
1 - The host might not even live in Thailand, they have "employees" (lovely, btw) that can't speak English. And the condominium says explicitly at the entrance about local law stating it is a CRIME hosting Airbnb short-stay periods in some Condo's (we were cool because we wanted to stay for months). I started to feel uncomfortable and felt "something strange".
2 - They said we could register fingerprints on the first day to avoid "sneaking in" (or climbing 5 fl. by stairs to sneak in the building), they asked for documents in advance, but on the day we moved, they said we needed to talk at reception a few days later.
3 - When we entered the room, I started to check everything (room, kitchen, bathroom), and we found it was a DIFFERENT ROOM. The thai lady that was with us went away while I was checking things... So the NIGHTMARE began. The air-con was not cooling. The shower was not heating... Besides not being functional, the room was not the same!
4 - I tried to reach the hosts and say it was NOT the same room. You can see the chat and pictures here (https://photos.app.goo.gl/m1PUXN8xTij5Zxpj7) or ask me. To be brief: I said it was not the same from the announcement, he tried to fool me saying it was. I sent pictures, he said the room was reformed. I sent pictures with comparison (red lining), he said it was a language mistake - the room and furnishes were totally reformed. I sent pictures with differences from wall position, toilet vase, the floor pattern, electrical outlets, pipes, etc. He refused to move us to another place (lie, said he hadn't any rooms, but they have dozens of announcements, some in the same building). He asked me to accept it. I said maybe, with discount - for the room WAS NOT THE SAME - and it was a long stay period. He said he couldn't discount the price. He said it was our problem and we could find another place to go - and he could GIVE US ONE NIGHT for free.
5 - One night for free is reasonable since WE CAN'T FIND A LONG TERM PLACE AND MOVE IN A FEW HOURS WITH ALL OUR LONG TERM STAY luggage with us during this nightmare. And we couldn't find a place to CHECK-IN late that day. We lost all the time trying to fee this nightmare asap. We couldn't have a proper lunch, a proper sleep at night (air-con was broken) and all the stressful situation was not helping.
6 - The next day we moved away to a new place, paying of course more money for a short stay place. Unfair, but we needed to avoid this VIOLENCE. After all this, I tried to reach the hosts to CANCEL the long term stay. They called me on my mobile (scary and creepy) and tried to fool me again (audio link 16' here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1PFPyfRH-vn0dD7DVIh9LH-F9FUyxFtto/view?usp=sharing ), said they didn't want to cancel to avoid penalties for hosts, including not paying the USD 100 penalty, or having the calendar blocked. They also said they could ONLY send me back the money after I changed the dates do 2 days (not 30 days, to avoid penalty block).
In the end, if you can accept basic things for a few days, it is up to you. If you plan in the long term as an expat living here, you SHOULD totally reconsider funding these kind of hosts.
Cheers and love!